All This

Name: All This
ISBN: 9787573003034

詹姆斯·索特 / 刘伟Hainan Publishing HouseMay 2022

4.0

Word count: 178K words
Chapters: 32
ISBN: 9787573003034

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Summary

The story begins at the end of World War II aboard a ship bound for Okinawa, where the protagonist, Philip Bowman, is a young naval officer. In the decades that follow, he returns to New York and becomes an editor at a publishing house, making his life amid book deals, literary careers, and one dinner party after another. He marries and divorces, new loves come in succession, physical passion runs its cycle, and he endures cruel betrayals. Old friends drift apart, houses are bought and sold, parents die, and the bonds of love fade and wither. When we last see Bowman, he has reached the age of seriously contemplating death: he wants to return to the Pacific, where "the only brave part of his life" lies.

Editor's review

Sotter uses a spare, restrained hand to stretch the life of an ordinary publishing editor into a decades-long scroll: from a ship bound for Okinawa at the end of World War II to a New York publishing house, dinner parties, marriage and divorce, successive loves and betrayals, and then the deaths of parents, the scattering of friends, houses bought and sold. The novel sets no dramatic climax, yet accumulates the weight of passing time through a wealth of everyday detail. Sotter's sentences are short and exact, his emotions never exposed, and readers often find themselves struck suddenly after some ordinary passage. Bowman's final wish to return to the Pacific, saying that there lies the only brave part of his life, gathers the whole book's melancholy into a single line. It suits reading at some stage of looking back on life, and suits readers who like calm narrative and recoil from sentimentality.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Literary readers who like a spare, restrained style and appreciate the power of accumulated detail
Readers interested in the life of New York intellectuals and the publishing world
Readers at a stage of looking back on life, willing to read a book about time
Those who have read other works by Sotter and want to go deeper into his style

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting strong conflict, dramatic turns, and a clear ending
Readers who prefer fervent lyricism or outwardly expressed emotion
Those hoping for publishing-industry insider stories or professional knowledge

Reading tips

Read linearly in chronological order; no notes needed, let the details accumulate naturally
Pause after each section to recall where Bowman stands now and how he differs from the previous stage
Notice how Sotter handles dialogue and blank space; that is the main source of the book's emotion
After finishing, look back at the opening ship passage to appreciate the deliberate echo of beginning and end

About the publisher

Hainan Publishing House China · Founded in 1985

Hainan Publishing House is a comprehensive publisher known for literary and intellectual works, covering foreign literature, philosophy, classics, world-famous works, classical poetry and prose miscellanies. Its catalog includes foreign literary classics such as Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina and Romain Rolland's Jean-Christophe, philosophical works such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau's The Social Contract: Expert Companion Edition, and Chinese classics and poetic studies such as Lu Xun's essays and prose collections and Wang Guowei's Renjian Cihua, as well as illustrated popular-science works like Fabre's Insects. The involvement of translators such as Zhong Shufeng, Fu Lei and Chen Xiaoqing reflects the publisher's emphasis on translation quality and expert guidance. Public information is limited, and the above is based mainly on the books in the catalog.

版权信息
1 破晓
2 伟大的城市
3 薇薇安
4 归于一体
5 在第十街
6 圣诞节在弗吉尼亚
7 女祭司
8 伦敦
9 舞会之后
10 科纳斯维尔
11 过渡期
12 西班牙
13 伊甸园
14 摩拉维亚
15 小木屋
16 萨米特
17 克莉丝汀
18 此时此刻
19 雨
20 池塘边的房子
21 蔚蓝色
22 大海的味道
23 醉生梦死
24 阿莫尔夫人
25 伊尔·坎蒂诺里
26 事出有因
27 宽恕
28 蒂沃利
29 一年将尽
30 一场婚礼
31 永无止境

FAQ

Is this a story about a successful person?

No. Bowman is a publishing editor with a respectable but not legendary life. The novel focuses on marriage, love affairs, friendship, the death of parents, and other common experiences, and on how a person slowly grows old among them, rather than on a success narrative.

Sotter's writing is very plain; will it feel dull to read?

On the surface it is indeed plain, with short sentences and no exposed emotion, but the detail is dense, and many seemingly casual everyday descriptions echo later in the book. If you are willing to read slowly and notice the blank spaces, you may find yourself moved.

Is it better to read in one sitting or in sections?

Either works. It is not long, but it spans a great deal of time; reading in sections makes it easier to feel the difference between each stage, while reading in one sitting lets you better feel the weight of time accumulated over the whole book.

Comments

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About the author

詹姆斯·索特 Author

James Salter is a writer of foreign literature known for both novels and short stories. His nationality, dates of birth and death, and other personal background are limited in publicly available sources, and no complete biography is provided in Chinese materials. Four of his works are included in the collection: Last Night, Dusk, Light Years, and All That. These titles suggest that his writing often focuses on everyday life, emotional relationships, and the passage of time, spanning both novels and short story collections and commonly classified under classic works and foreign literature. Because public information is limited, it is difficult to detail his specific experiences and chronology, but the available titles still indicate attention to narrative pacing and inner lives of characters, with restrained and readable prose suited to readers interested in contemporary foreign literature.

刘伟 Author

Liu Wei is an author whose works span a wide range of fields, though limited public information is available about his personal background, including his dates of birth and death, nationality, and education. Judging from the 59 works included in the collection, his writing interests cover culture, social sciences, foreign literature, management, politics, and finance. Among his representative works, Twelve Lectures on Chinese Civilization and The Way of Vessels: A History of Chinese Tea Ware Civilization reflect his attention to traditional culture and the beauty of objects, while A Peking University Professor Talks with College Students: Liu Wei on Economics and Life shows his attempt to discuss life through an economic lens. The Politics of Ordinary People's Discourse: A Perspective on Peasants' Political Psychology in Transitional China and the China Economic Growth Report 2017 indicate his engagement with political psychology and macroeconomic research. He has also translated or written foreign literary works such as Murder in the Dark and All This, as well as books on sales. Overall, his writing is broad in scope and balances scholarship with readability.